Blog

By Alicia Sparks, Psych Central, June 10, 2019. As it turns out, not only will teasing an overweight child or teenager not help motivate them to lose weight; the teasing could actually contribute to an increase in weight. According to a new study , children who were teased or ridiculed about their weight saw an annual increase in weight by 33 percent. Researchers at the National Institutes of Health theorize weight-associated stigma might have led to the youths engaging in unhealthy...

Addiction, anxiety, and depression can be all-consuming and enslaving. When I was spending every night, isolated in my room, indulging in opiates and vodka - my entire world hyper-focused and revolved around my pain. It was certainly not the life I was choosing - or so I thought. My messy head was tortuous, chaotic, and I felt absolutely powerless against it. All of my thoughts were amplified extensions of: “You are never going to be enough and you are unworthy of love and happiness.” I did...

While @Donna Jackson Nakazawa is usually too busy writing books, training, and research to blog, she does share gems, nuggets, and information every once in a while on Twitter or Facebook which demand to be turned into blogs. With her permission to post, here's a recent, consolidated Tweet thread version of her writing. It's in response to another thread by Jennifer Brea (which can be found here) where she details about what we can expect from her upcoming book, The Angel and the...

By David Murphey and Jessica Dym Bartlett, Child Trends, July 9, 2019. Exposure to adversity in childhood is widespread and can pose a serious threat to individual health and well-being over the life course. By age 18, nearly half (45 percent) of children in the United States have had at least one adverse experience; among young children and other vulnerable subgroups, the prevalence is much higher. Childhood adversity is defined as one or more stressful events or conditions that can...

By The Chronicle of Social Change, July 10, 2019. By the time Skylar was a teenager , his mother was serving a life sentence for manslaughter. His biological father was homeless, addicted to drugs and completely uninvolved in his life. As a result, Skylar began to spiral into destructive behaviors, such as theft, assault and defiance toward authority. With the help and support of residential behavioral health treatment provided by Sequel Youth and Family Services, he was able to stabilize...

By Mark Bekoff, Psychology Today, July 10, 2019. An outstanding forward-looking new book called Transforming Trauma: Resilience and Healing Through Our Connections With Animals recently crossed my desk and it's my pleasure to spread the word about it through an interview with its editors, Philip Tedeschi and Molly Anne Jenkins of the Institute for Human-Animal Connection in the Graduate School of Social Work at the University of Denver. Transforming Trauma is a book many people have long...

Safety must be addressed first throughout trauma treatment. This is especially the case with traumatized children and their families because the child is often more vulnerable to abuse or neglect. The FST| Family Systems Trauma Model presents the use of a safety risk scale of 1 to 5 (1= no risk; 5 = high risk) to assess current safety levels within the family. The use of what is called an FST Trauma Safety Playbook is then used if needed to realign a chaotic and disorganized family with...

Migrants mainly from Central America seeking asylum guide their children through the entrance of a World War II-era airplane hangar in Deming, N.M., that is being used as a shelter . Credit Cedar Attanasio/Associated Press Speak up. Donate. Educate yourself. Vote. By The Editorial Board (Originally published 6.24.19) The editorial board represents the opinions of the board, its editor and the publisher. It is separate from the newsroom and the Op-Ed section. This editorial has been updated...

I am well aware of these fears and why they are present, after my four year stint in EMDR therapy, so I honor their presence and just notice them without judgment. I remind myself these are physiological responses triggered by chemical surges in my brain in relation to past traumatic events. I am working at re-wiring my brain and creating new neural pathways, but that is still a work in process.

By Tovin Lapin, Fortune, July 11, 2019. Galvanized by the steady stream of disturbing details spilling out of U.S. immigrant detention centers, protests of inhumane conditions at the facilities are expanding. Now, a plan for a rally and vigil on Friday, July 12, has drawn widespread support, with more than 600 demonstrations planned on five continents. Lights for Liberty is helping organize vigils across the country with the goal of ending immigrant detention, and the coalition has struck...

By Corey Jones, Tulsa World, July 7, 2019. Patients would carry soda into Dr. Gerard Clancy’s office, with cigarettes tucked away for after therapy. Often victims of abuse or violent crime, they would seek soothing but risky behaviors to cope. Overweight. Chronic pain. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Type II diabetes. His former patients will die younger than they should, he said. Clancy conducted therapy sessions until he became president of the University of Tulsa in 2016. At his...

By Julia Rosen, Los Angeles Times, July 8, 2019. There’s the old saying that you should never discuss politics or religion in polite company. Nowadays, it seems climate change has joined that list. Barely more than a third of Americans broach the subject often or even occasionally, according to a recent survey by researchers at the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication . All this not talking about climate change has given Americans a rather skewed perception of what the rest of the...